Home News

Oct. 25, 2017—If you’re concerned that “porch pirates” will steal delivered packages from your doorstep, Amazon.com has a solution—let its couriers enter your home to deliver the packages while you’re away.

Health News

Oct. 17, 2017—Consumers will be hurt by the Trump administration’s moves to change the Affordable Care Act (ACA), experts tell us. The only questions are by how much and whether that will change in the years ahead.

Nov. 17, 2016—Further evidence that no matter how bad that it gets when it comes to air travel, it always could get worse comes to us through United Airlines’ announcement of a reduced-fare class that comes with restrictions attached—the biggest being a limit on the size of carry-on luggage.

Money News

Oct. 25, 2017—If you’re concerned that “porch pirates” will steal delivered packages from your doorstep, Amazon.com has a solution—let its couriers enter your home to deliver the packages while you’re away.

Top-Rated Water Filters: Clear Leaders

Pitchers • Faucet-Mount • Countertop • Under-Sink • Showerhead

Finally, a standard exists for evaluating whether water filters are capable of reducing trace amounts of contaminants, such as pharmaceuticals, from drinking water. However, scientists and experts disagree over whether low levels of these contaminants pose a health threat in the first place.

By Robert E. CalemArticle Published: July 2015Best Buy Recommendations: Current

Email to a Friend

To:

Your Email:

Your Name:

Subject:

Message:

Shutterstock

It took 6 years, but in August 2014, National Sanitation Foundation (NSF) and industry experts finally introduced a certification standard to evaluate the capability of water filters to reduce levels of so-called emerging contaminants that are in drinking water.

The new standard, NSF/ANSI 401, addresses 15 contaminants, including herbicides, manufacturing chemicals, over-the-counter medications, pesticides and pharmaceuticals. Previously, NSF/ANSI standards in drinking water existed in regard to killing microorganisms. (For a complete list of contaminants that the new standard covers, see “Drinking Water’s New Standard.”)

Despite the new standard, however, no consensus exists on whether trace levels of these contaminants in drinking water pose any threat to public health.

Rick Andrew of NSF tells us that research to identify and understand the “thousands of different chemicals that could be in the water” will take “many years.” He says NSF Joint Committee on Drinking Water Treatment Units will expand NSF/ANSI 401 to include more contaminants in the coming years.

“Understanding the toxicological significance of these compounds and contaminants in the drinking water at low concentrations will take quite some time and study,” Andrew tells Consumers Digest.

Best Buys in Water Filters & Water Softeners

As of press time, 122 water-filtration systems from 16 companies were certified by NSF to meet the new standard. They start at $45.

For peace of mind, “you don’t want to be ingesting any of these things,” says Zack Schroeck of manufacturer Culligan International. No Culligan products are certified to meet the new standard. “In most cases, it’s been found that there’s not that much of [the contaminants] in water,” Schroeck says.

BACTERIA PROTECTION. Waterlogic also doesn’t make a water-filtration system that’s certified to meet the NSF/ANSI 401 standard. Nevertheless, the company says “no other drinking-water purifier” delivers the same purity as its 2-year-old countertop Hybrid Water Purifier ($199). In the Hybrid, water flows through an active-carbon filter that reduces contaminants, such as chlorine and lead. This is conventional. However, the water then travels through a quartz spiral where it’s exposed to ultraviolet (UV) light that the company says destroys bacteria. This makes the Hybrid the only countertop water-filtration system that we found that uses UV light, and the model meets the NSF P231 protocol for microbiological purity and the NSF/ANSI 55 Class A standard for UV microbiological water-treatment systems. We found a few under-sink water-filtration systems that incorporate UV light, but they typically cost at least $1,000.

Waterlogic says UV light is necessary, because when a water filter removes chlorine from drinking water (as they all do), it also removes protection against bacterial growth inside of the water filter, says Moshe Gazit of Waterlogic. “Our philosophy is that just filtering the water is not enough,” he says.

Drinking Water’s New Standard

Before you start to worry about whether microbiological contaminants form in your filtered drinking water, you should relax. Experts tell us that microbiological contaminants are a concern in the drinking-water systems of some developing countries but not in the United States, at least not on a regular basis.

“Thankfully, we don’t have to worry about bacteria as much as other parts of the world,” says Matt Chilton of ZeroWater.

Waterlogic agrees that bacteria is a bigger problem in developing countries than in the United States, but the company says it wants to provide as many safeguards as possible against bacteria and chemicals.

Andrew agrees. He says microbiological safeguards are useful when a boil advisory exists because of a broken water main or pipe. Furthermore, private-well owners occasionally have problems with contamination. Finally, drinking-water sources, such as lakes and rivers, can be contaminated with cryptosporidium, which is resistant to chemical disinfectants and can cause gastrointestinal issues. If you draw water directly from a lake or river, a certified microbiological-treatment water-filtration system will prevent exposure to cryptosporidium, Andrew says.